Covid hit F&B hard, consider their input for new measures

I REFER to the article "Stop slaughtering F&B as the sacrificial lamb" (The Business Times, Sept 28, 2021). We bleed for the restaurants operating (or rather, not granted laissez-faire to operate normally) during this cataclysmic time of Covid. It is hard not to empathise with the plaintive cry of desperation that Ivan Brehm lets out as he laments how inimical the measures to control the pandemic have been to the food and beverage industry.

Yet, crushing as the measures are, I am confident that the fine Michelin-starred Nouri and Appetite restaurants, that he is chef-owner of, will have the resilience to weather what we expect will be the final surge of infections as we move into the new normal era of coexistence with the virus, even as we bereave the collapse of so many local marque branded food establishments.

Brehm has been very tempered in his measured response against what he perceives to be unfair treatment of F&B establishments anytime heightened alert restrictions kick up a gear, querulous that a reduction in restaurant capacity would slow down the latest numbers that have arisen in dormitories, wet markets, wholesale centres and bus interchanges.

With vaccinations, the proportion of asymptomatic and very mildly symptomatic Covid-19 infections now far outweigh those with florid manifestations. Bearing in mind then that those symptomatic victims picked up now may just be the tip of the iceberg, that the asymptomatic still transmit disease, that accredited rapid antigen tests are not mandated in small group dining, that major superspreading events here in Singapore have been indubitably traced to banquets and merrymaking in food establishments - and you can see why restaurants are always targeted in any anti-Covid strategy globally. Au contraire to what Brehm thinks, it is always for good empirical reason.

Repeated studies have incontrovertibly shown that dining in a restaurant - especially if enclosed and air-conditioned - more than doubles the risk of Covid transmission. The virus can spread beyond a 5-metre radius easily within five minutes - a longer distance than the present social distancing measure of 2 metres and a far shorter time than unmasked diners need for a quick meal - and this for the already less infectious Alpha, Beta and Gamma variants even before taking into consideration the far more infectious and prevalent Delta strain now. It is an unfortunate fact of life for eateries that mucous and saliva are Covid's best friends.

So, we know the magnitude of the problem Covid poses for shared dining and the conundrum authorities must face in determining what constitutes balanced measures between restricting restaurant dining, the fiscal aid that restaurants need as they go on life support, and then also allowing our lives to get on as it must, as safely and typically as possible.

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The group #savefnbsg, a ground-up initiative representing more than 500 restaurants and local companies, has come up with many entirely feasible and practicable solutions to resuscitate the go-stop-go, hard-hit F&B industry. If the authorities adapt and adopt further measures for diners to battle Covid, resulting in yet more revivify-"sock it to them"-reanimate policies, they surely must make #savefnbsg and any other legitimately concerned groups party to new formulations.

Dr Yik Keng Yeong